A Society of Books is a blog that I hope presents from all corners of the globe a glimpse into the literary happenings of society. I will try and mine the internet for interesting articles about the book world we all enjoy.

Sunday, May 3, 2009

Why Book Critics Go On for Inches

I sometimes wonder why quality publications spend a lot of column inches on a book they think is terrible. One gets the message in the first two paragraphs. It's like the reviewer wasn't content with killing the beast but then had to chop it up into hamburger.

—Marv Atkins, St. Petersburg, Fla.

Once you kill the beast, you may as well make hamburger. The critic has, after all, presumably read the whole book, sometimes with mounting fury at the waste of his or her diminishing time on earth.